


To the Stars and Beyond

by SeverusMinerva, WhovianQueen221B



Category: Doctor Who, Doctor Who & Related Fandoms, Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: Age Difference, College, Friendship, Love, Multi, Spoilers, Tried to be a slow burn but the thirst is real, We love the TARDIS in this house
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-01-10
Updated: 2019-03-17
Packaged: 2019-10-07 14:19:48
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 7,346
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17367464
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SeverusMinerva/pseuds/SeverusMinerva, https://archiveofourown.org/users/WhovianQueen221B/pseuds/WhovianQueen221B
Summary: Y/N is a sophomore in college. School is going pretty normally until one day she meets someone that will change her life forever.





	1. Doctor Who?

**Author's Note:**

> Hello friends and welcome to my FIRST EVER fanfic post. This work is a collaboration with two of my closest friends and we are beyond excited (but nervous) to share it with you all. We would love to hear what you think about this story so please leave comments and kudos. We hope that you enjoy the story and continue to show us your support. You can check out SeverusMinerva's work (she's great!). Again, enjoy the story and get ready to travel the stars with the Doctor. :)
> 
> Much love, V.
> 
> Hi, guys. Ditto to everything V wrote. Just wanted to add that we've decided to try to have a new chapter posted every Saturday from now on. College is sometimes hard, so bear with us as we do this thing. <3  
> -SM

“Today’s the day.  I can feel it.” 

The Doctor entered the coordinates of where he had been told a rogue Dalek had been seen.  The TARDIS began whirling, bringing a mischievous smile to his face. “Something amazing is going to happen today.” 

When the TARDIS landed, the Doctor walked over to the door, pausing to take a deep breath. 

“Let’s do this.” 

He threw open the door and jumped out, preparing for the head-on attack that should have been awaiting him.  What he wasn’t prepared to see was a very surprised college girl walking out of the dormitory in front of him.  The Doctor stared at her confused expression, his own face reflecting the same feeling. 

“Um...” the girl began, eyeing the Doctor apprehensively.  He realized he was pointing his sonic screwdriver in her face, and quickly put it away.   

“What is this?!  A college?!” the Doctor exclaimed, turning back to look at the TARDIS with raised eyebrows.  “You brought me to a bloody college?! I was looking for a Dalek! What am I doing on a college campus in...” he put on his sonic sunglasses and tapped the side, “Monmouth, Illinois?  Where even is Monmouth, Illinois anyway?” 

He turned back to see that the girl was still standing there, the confusion replaced with growing interest.  He sighed and walked up to her. 

“Hi.”  

The girl tilted her head slightly and smiled, amused.  “Hi.” 

“Would you happen to know where I could find a rogue Dalek? It’s about,” he holds his hand to about his shoulder, “Yea high, has a superiority complex, and shoots at anything that moves? If you have, could you please direct me to it, so I can ah...deal with it?”  

There was a pause.  The Doctor sighed, and muttered under his breath, “Of course not,” turning to go back into the TARDIS.  However, to his surprise, the girl burst out laughing. The Doctor looked back at her. He should have been annoyed, but for some reason, listening to her laugh made him...happy.   When she finally stopped laughing, she said, “I’m gonna be late to Bio.” 

The Doctor frowned at her, puzzled at her flippant attitude.  “Did you not just hear what I said?” 

The girl began walking back towards the building, getting out her keycard to unlock the door. She gestured for the Doctor to follow her.

“I heard what you said, and  _ that’s  _ why I’m going to be late.”   

The Doctor watched the girl walk away from him with admiration in his eyes.  He began to go after her when she suddenly said, “Y/N.” 

“I’m sorry, what?” the Doctor asked, unsure of how else to respond.    

“Y/N.  That’s my name,” she said, leading him over to the building's elevator and pressing the ‘up’ button.  “You’ll want to remember it.” 

The doors immediately opened, and she walked into the elevator, pressing the button for the second floor before turning back to him.  He looked at her with immense curiosity. “And why is that?” He stepped onto the elevator and turned to face the doors, trying to ignore his growing interest in Y/N.   

“Because I’m the girl who caught a Dalek,” she said, smirking.   

The elevator doors closed as the Doctor looked at the girl, awe plastered across his face.   

\--

The Doctor was nearly speechless.  Y/N- seemingly normal, completely human Y/N- had somehow captured a Dalek and kept it in her room, where she  _ slept _ , for an unknown amount of time.  All he could do was stare between the concerningly quiet weapon of mass destruction that clashed harshly against the rest of the room, and the room’s owner.  She was inexplicably calm about all of this, bouncing from thing to thing: putting her book bag down, fluffing her pillows, and grabbing a bag of Flamin’ Hots from her food bin.  His gaze fell upon the blue of a St. Andrew’s cross hanging from her wall.

“Are you Scottish?  You don’t sound like it.”  He would’ve recognized a fellow Scot anywhere.  Y/N flopped down on her bed and sighed.

“It’s a long story.  Now tell me what this thing is doing at my college.”  He had to resist the urge to snort at her obvious deflection of his question.  Yes, they were going to get on quite nicely. He inwardly frowned at that unbidden thought; why was he thinking that they were going to even have time to get on in any way?  He was going to destroy the damned Dalek and be done with the whole thing.

“Hello?  You never actually told me your name, you know.  I can’t call you anything.” He jumped, realizing that he must have gone into some sort of thinking trance because Y/N was waving her hand in front of his face.  He took a step back and shook his head.

“You can call me the Doctor,” he said as he stepped around her to look more closely at the Dalek.  He put his sunglasses back on, and went to work.

“Doctor who?”  Y/N asked a few moments later, not wanting to interrupt what was clearly his ‘process’.  The Doctor turned and smiled at her coyly.

“Just ‘Doctor’.”  He went back to his examination.  This was odd. The Dalek appeared to be in sleep mode, if one could call it that.  He had never seen that happen naturally, unless-

“Okay, ‘Just Doctor’, can you tell me what this thing is doing here?  It’s taking up a lot of space, ya know? My room is small enough as it is.”  He turned to stare at her.

“How do you know how to disable a Dalek?”  The serious look on his face told Y/N that this would not be a good time for a good-natured joke, but she made it anyway. 

“I dunno, I kinda mashed buttons a little bit-”

“‘Mashed buttons?’  What do you mean ‘mashed buttons’?  What buttons?”

Y/N took out her phone and walked over to sit on her desk.

“A few weeks ago, I was sitting on the Quad, waiting to meet up with my friends when this  _ really  _ hot girl came over and started talking to me.  She was like, major cute, Doctor-” The Doctor cut her off again before she could start rambling.

“While I’m sure this story is probably sweet and adorable and just  _ lovely _ ,” the Doctor rolled his eyes, tired of thinking of the scene of Y/N with her mystery girl, “I really want to know how you have the technology to put an instant death machine in sleep mode.” 

“I was getting to that part.  Anyway, this hot girl approached me and we were bonding for a while. She offered to give me her number which I gladly accepted, so I gave her my phone-”  The Doctor stops her, yet again, clearly getting more irritated as the story continued. 

“I don’t think you’re gettin’ it dearie,” the Doctor began before Y/N quickly stopped him to redirect his attention to her story.

“Geez! Can you let a girl finish her story?” she protested, angrily walking toward him. 

“I’d rather you just tell me the bits I need to know….stories can get boring, they’re hardly original, and I never liked endings.”  

Y/N shoved her phone in the Doctor’s face and he squirmed to move it to a distance from which he could actually read it.  When he saw the screen, he froze. His face was a mixture of confusion and horror. 

“How did you get this?” he asked, trying to keep his voice from shaking. 

Y/N let out another sigh and looked up at the Doctor.  “I gave the girl my phone so she could put her number in it, but instead she must’ve downloaded this app.” She moved back a few steps to look at the Doctor.  

The Doctor followed her, backing her against the edge of her bed.  “Who was this girl? How did she get this? No one should have these codes.   _ I _ don’t even have these codes!”  

Y/N stood her ground as the Doctor leaned in a bit too close to inspect her again.  She closed her eyes and took a deep breath to calm her rapidly beating heart, trying to keep her composure.  

“She told me her name was Bella, but I haven’t seen her on campus since and no one else seems to know who she is.” The Doctor continued to examine Y/N for a few more moments before backing away.  

“You’re definitely human,” he mumbled, slightly disappointed.  “Do you know if this Bella girl was...different or special? Did she have any unexplainable tendencies, unique features, or smells...?”  He pulled out his screwdriver and did a quick scan of Y/N. He turned away to examine the results. 

“Not really.  She had dark brown hair, grey eyes, and smelled really nice, like vanilla and cinnamon and...something else that I’ve never smelled before.”  The Doctor stopped and slowly turned back to Y/N, displaying a look of deep dismay. “Bloody hell,” he sighed, rubbing his forehead and walking toward the door.  

He turned back to Y/N when he noticed she wasn’t following him.  “Well come on,” he said motioning at her. “I need you for this to work.” 

“For what to work?” Y/N asked, jogging to catch up with the Doctor.  “Where are we going?” 

“We are going to my TARDIS to track your girlfriend, Bella,” the Doctor huffed, unsure if he was more annoyed with the possibilities of who Bella could be or that Y/N liked her.  

\--

“This is your TARDIS?”  Y/N stood looking in disbelief at the old-fashioned British police box standing in front of her.  The Doctor had just finished explaining what the TARDIS was and, like his previous companions, Y/N was excited at the idea of traveling through time and space, but unsure of the small blue box that stood in front of them.  

The Doctor nodded and opened the door for Y/N to go through.  She smiled at him hesitantly before entering and looking around astonished at the inside of the TARDIS.  “Huh.” 

The Doctor’s face fell at her one-worded, apparently unimpressed response.  “‘Huh’? You just saw what is surely the greatest, most sophisticated technology in the universe, and your response is ‘huh’?”  

Y/N turned back to the Doctor and shrugged.  “I kind of assumed that if this was a space and time travelling machine, then there would have to be something impressive about it.  And this,” she said, waving her hands around at the TARDIS and smiling, “is  _ very  _ impressive.”  

The Doctor stood there at the door for a moment, still shocked at her underwhelming reaction and somewhat intrigued by her calmness of everything.  “Well then!” He shook his head abruptly and made his way to the console. 

He began pressing buttons and pulling levers.  Y/N moved closer to see what he was doing, wondering how on Earth he knew what all those different things do.  Noticing that she was watching him, the Doctor turned to smile at her. 

“Now for your part.”  He used his finger to motion her closer to where he was standing.  Y/N frowned, not knowing where he was going with this, but obeyed.

“Yes, Doctor?”  She lifted her head and was instantly mesmerised by the Doctor’s blue-green eyes.  She couldn’t tear her eyes away from his even if she had wanted to. The Doctor was facing the same problem.  Something almost tangible sparked between the two of them, and although they didn’t know it yet, a plan had just been set into motion.  The Doctor blinked rapidly several times before shaking his head. 

“Yes.  Right. Here we go.”  He took Y/N by the shoulders and positioned her so that she was standing in front of him.  He let go of her shoulders to hover his hands over her forearms and, not for the first time since meeting her, felt unsure of himself.  Y/N watched his hands for a bit and decided to move the process along. She lifted her arms so that his hands were on her. The feeling of her skin against his snapped him back into action.  He took her hands gently in his and moved to press them into something that made Y/N think of some kind of alien from Star Trek. He felt her tense up against him.

“Don’t worry, this won’t hurt a bit,” he reassured her.

“Wait, what--”  The Doctor didn’t let her finish her question, placing her hands into the...alien thingy.  There was a second of silence, and then Y/N yelped in pain. “Liar! You said it wouldn’t hurt!” 

“Rule Number One: I lie.”  He let go of her, going over to the other side of the console to look at the monitor.  Y/N huffed in annoyance but kept her fingers where they were.

“What the hell is this, anyway?”  

“It’s a thing,” the Doctor replied distractedly after a moment.

“A thing?!  This is your TARDIS, Doctor, shouldn’t you know what it is by now?”  The Doctor rolled his eyes.

“Of course I know what it is, I designed it.  It’s meant to connect a person to the TARDIS mainframe.  If I’m right, and I’m always right, I should be able to use it to figure out where your girlfriend went after she left that day -”

“She’s not my girlfriend,” Y/N corrected him without even thinking.  The Doctor glanced at her out of the corner of his eye, his hearts beginning to beat just a tad bit faster in his chest.

“No?”  The Doctor cursed inwardly at how hopeful his voice sounded to himself.  He hadn’t even known this girl for a day yet. It was disgusting. Y/N’s voice broke him out of that particular train of thought.

“Nope.”  He could tell that she was looking at him, but he refused to return the gaze, trying to avoid another staring contest like before.

“Good.”

“Good?  Why is that good, Doctor?”  Before he could respond, the monitor made an unpleasant beeping noise.  The Doctor took the interruption gladly, examining the information on the screen.

“Damn!  She’s too good!”  He bit his lip, turning away to lean back against the console.

“What?  What is it?  What do you mean she’s too good?” 

The Doctor didn’t respond.  He was deep in thought for a moment before he snapped his fingers and spun around to look at Y/N.  “I need your phone.” 

Y/N looked at him in bewilderment.  “My phone? What do you want with my phone?” 

“I need it to help track your NOT girlfriend,” the Doctor said, walking over to her and holding out his hand.  “Phone.” 

Y/N let out a loud sigh and looked down at the floor.  When she looked back at him, she had a sly smile across her face.  “It’s in my back pocket.” 

The Doctor hesitated. He looked down into her eyes and then moved ever so slowly behind her.  The Doctor slid his hand down her lower back and into her back pocket to grab the phone. Y/N let out a small gasp, bringing the Doctor back to the present.  He quickly pulled the phone out of the pocket and rushed back to the other side of the console. 

“I need to connect your phone to the TARDIS so that I can see if she left any clues on it.”  The Doctor connected the phone and began his rhythmic button pressing that Y/N was beginning to enjoy the more she heard it.  

“So how long do I need to keep my hands in here?” she asked, feeling the desire to be able to move around again.   

The Doctor glanced up at her before looking back at the TARDIS and continuing his work.  “For as long as she wants you to keep them there, dearie.” 

The TARDIS began to whirl before Y/N could respond to his statement.  The Doctor began laughing and grabbed onto the console. “Yes! She’s taking us to your NOT girlfriend!”

“Can you not call her that?  I don’t -” Y/N began, but was promptly cut off by the TARDIS landing.  The Doctor rushed over to Y/N, grabbed her hands, and pulled her over to the doors of the TARDIS.  He turned to her with a playful gaze and a stupid grin across his face. “Are you ready?” 

Y/N looked up into the Doctor’s eyes and all she could see was a sparkle that screamed excitement.  She smiled and, pushing all of her doubt out of her head, squeezed his hands. “Yes.” 

_ Somewhere, a Dalek begins to reboot itself. _


	2. Just Another Day

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is the same morning that you meet The Doctor but from your roommates' POV. ENJOY!

_ Dorm Room, 8:00  am  _

 

_ ‘The moment you arrived they built you up _ __   
_ The sun was in your eyes _ __   
_ You couldn't believe it _ __   
_ Riches all around, you're walking _ __   
_ Stars are on the ground _ _   
_ __ You start to believe it’

 

Maria groaned before bellowing, “ELLE!  Get up. Your alarm is going off.” 

Her roommate turned over and let out a muffled groan. Maria sat up and sighed at her sleeping roommate.  Elle never liked getting up for her 9 am class, and Maria wasn’t fond of listening to her alarm for 5 minutes straight.  “I love listening to Panic, but it’s too early for this.” 

Maria reluctantly got out of her warm bed and went to the bathroom as Elle mustered up the energy to reach for her phone.  “Shit, I forgot to cancel that alarm,” she exhaled. She picked up her phone and turned off the alarm, only to drop back down and continue sleeping.  When Maria finished in the bathroom, she found her roommate still laying down, but her eyes were glued on her phone as they were most mornings. 

“What’s on the agenda for today, E?”  Realizing that a conversation was about to begin, Elle put her phone down and sat up.

“Well, my 9 am got cancelled, so it’s just Astronomy at 10 and Art at 1.” 

“Don’t ya love it when professors cancel class right before it starts?” Maria posed sarcastically.

“Yeah, it’s great!” Elle exclaimed, continuing the sarcastic trend.  Maria turned to look at the clock and noticed it was only 8:15 am. 

“I don’t have class until 10 either so  I guess it’s chill time.” The girls shared a short laugh and sat on their beds, phones in hand.  Elle was going through her Snap Streaks while Maria read fanfiction. The girls were residents of Pattee Hall in a room that was a triple: a double attached to a single bed by a conjoining bathroom.  It was easy to hear who was awake at what hour since the doors were so thin. 

In the single room, Y/N’s alarm began to ring  quite obnoxiously. Much like Elle, Y/N didn’t turn her alarm off right away.  Maria did her signature knock on the shared wall, waiting for Y/N’s response knocks that signified that she was awake.  As soon as she heard them, Maria jumped up and walk over to the connecting door. She knocked three times before opening it to see that Y/N, still half-asleep, was sitting up.  

“Good morning!”  Maria said in her chipmunk voice.  Y/N looked at her sleepily, clearly unamused by Maria’s daily theatrics. 

“Hello.  Can I help you?” she lazily responded.

“Not really.  I just wanted to say ‘hi’ and see your beautiful face.”  Maria smiled, sitting on the end of the bed.

“That’s really gay Maria,” Y/N laughed.  Maria rolled her eyes and continued speaking.

“You ready for a great day?  What are your plans?”

“Nothing extraordinary is happening.  I have class….and then sleep. Sleep sounds good.”  Y/N laid back down on her bed and covered herself in a way that made her look like a caterpillar.  Maria reached for the covers and yanked them. 

“Wakey wakey,” Maria exclaimed, smiling innocently.  Y/N huffed and sat up.

“We should all go get lunch, or dinner, or something.  Sleep will always be here for you when you get back,” Maria said, moving to allow Y/N to get up.  Y/N nodded. Though she didn’t care much for this idea, she really wanted Maria to shut up. Y/N rose to her feet and motioned to the bathroom.  As she left, Maria followed, walking back to her side of the dorm and seeing that Elle was, surprisingly, out of her bed. 

“Did Y/N say yes to lunch?” Elle called from in the closet.  

“How would  you have heard that from over there?” Maria called back, going to her dresser to get herself ready as well.  

Elle walked out from the closet, fully dressed, and made her way back to her bed to promptly lay down and check her phone again.  “I’m magical,” she said, smiling. Maria rolled her eyes and walked over to the closet, hearing Elle and Y/N exchange their ‘good morning’s.  

After Maria finished getting dressed, she sat on her bed with her Chemistry books and began studying.  She had a quiz later and although she could potentially drop it if she didn’t do well, she wanted to save that for a quiz she would really need it for, and that was not today’s.  She was in the middle of solving a problem when she heard Elle ask, “Are you studying for your quiz again?” 

Maria answered without looking up.  “Yes. I need to at least get a 92 to get an A.” 

Elle rolled over onto her stomach and laughed.  “You’re going to do fine. You’ve been studying for the quiz for two days.”  Maria sighed, finally looking up at her roommate. “I know,” she said, “but I want to make sure.”  

Elle laughed.  “You’re going to pass.  You are smart, you are beautiful, you are amazing and talented and wonderful…”  Maria groaned and fell back on the bed. Elle loved to tell her how great she was whenever she began to doubt herself, and she appreciated it.  She really did. 

Just then, Y/N appeared in the bathroom doorway.  “I’m gonna go to class now.” 

Maria sat up and turned to Y/N.  “Lunch at noon?” she asked hopefully.  Y/N looked at her for a second before responding.  “Um...sure.” 

Maria smiled giddily.  “Yay! Okay, well have fun in class!”  Y/N laughed at the response and they all said their goodbyes before Y/N closed the connecting door and Maria and Elle heard the closing of the outer door.  Maria turned back to Elle and asked, “You said yes to lunch right?” 

Elle responded, “I’m free from 12 to 1 so yeah.”  Maria nodded and went back to studying. A few minutes passed by before they heard the outer door of Y/N’s room bounce shut.  The girls looked at each other in confusion. “Maybe she left something,” Elle said questioningly. 

“Yeah, maybe,” Maria said, feeling a vague sense of doubt but pushing it out of her mind.  “You’ve got your bag packed already, right?” Elle sighed and begrudgingly got up to grab a few books and toss them into her bag.  “Thanks for reminding me,” she said, a hint of sarcasm in her voice. 

When she had finished putting together her bag, Elle laid back down on her bed with her phone.  Maria glanced over to see her roommate mezmorized. She sighed and grabbed her own phone and asked, “Do you mind if I put on some music?”  

Without looking away from her phone, Elle responded, “Nope.  I was thinking of doing that if you weren’t going to.” Maria opened her Spotify and put on the Daily Mix.  After a few skipped songs, she settled on the song ‘Misery Business’. 

Maria turned the volume all the way up and began singing along as dramatically as she could.  Elle laughed and was soon humming the tune as well. They often had these moments while listening to music where one of them - usually Maria - would dramatically sing to the other.  It was a great way to cheer each other up after a bad day or to start the day on an up beat. 

After a bit, they were humming along to the music when a very loud noise began and slowly disappeared.  Elle and Maria were startled by the foreign noise. The two shared a glance of complete bewilderment before Elle stood up from her bed.  “What the  _ fuck _ was that sound?” 

Maria hurried to the window, pulling the blinds aside to look out at the open field outside their dorm.  “I have no clue, but it sounded really close, like it was coming from inside the dorm. Have you heard anything like that before?”  Elle shook her head, moving to stand next to her roomate. Maria’s frown deepened.

“That was so weird.  I feel like…” she stopped herself, knowing that what she was about to say could sound really, really stupid.

“You feel like what?” Elle encouraged her, putting a hand on Maria’s arm.  Maria glanced down at her roommate before continuing.

“Like we weren’t supposed to hear it.”

“What do you mean?”

“Well, we both heard the sound, right?” Maria said, turning toward Elle who nodded.  “So we aren’t crazy. But it feels like my brain is trying to tell me to ignore it, like something doesn’t want me to dwell on it too much.”

“Yeah, it was pretty strange…” Elle trailed off, staring out the window.  She turned abruptly to Maria, a worried expression on her face. “Wanna see if Y/N heard anything?” 

Maria nodded and followed her friend out of their room, through the bathroom, and to Y/N’s door.  Maria did her three knocks on the door and waited for Y/N to say something. When there was no answer, she frowned and tried again.

“That’s weird, I know I heard her opening the door,” Elle commented. 

“Yeah, me too.”  Maria agreed. She waited a little bit longer before sighing and opening the door herself.  The sight that greeted her was not at all what she had expected. 

Y/N was nowhere to be found, but in the middle of the room stood a robot-looking thing that was nearly as tall as Elle was, with what appeared to be a toilet plunger and a old-fashioned kitchen whisk for arms.  It took up most of the space in the room just by sitting there, motionlessly. 

“What in the world is that?!”  Maria exclaimed. In the back of her mind, she knew that something about the robot was terribly, terribly wrong.  However, she pushed that thought away as she took a step closer to it. Elle’s arm shot out to stop her. 

“What if it’s dangerous?” Elle asked her, probably a bit louder than she wanted it to be.  Maria looked at her friend, and then back at the robot. 

“I don’t have a good feeling about this...but if it’s something that Y/N brought into the room, don’t we have a right to know what it is?”  Elle pursed her lips and thought for a moment before nodding reluctantly. 

“I guess.  Let’s go together, okay?”  She offered her hand to Maria, who took it and smiled at her. 

“Together.”

They both stepped towards the robot.  When nothing happened, Maria let go of Elle’s hand and began to circle around  it.

“I wonder what all these round things do?”  She pondered. Elle snorted, making her look up. “What?  What did I say?” 

“Nothing.  If Y/N were here, she would’ve made a joke about little balls.”  Maria giggled at the thought.

“Yeah, she would have.”  Maria continued inspecting the machinery, not noticing Elle moving closer to it.  She focused on a ball that seemed to be further out than the others. “One of the balls isn’t right,” Elle murmured, reaching out to adjust it.  

Maria looked around the machine to see what she was doing.  She scrambled to pull Elle away. “No! Don’t-” 

Maria pulled Elle away, but it was too late.  The machine began clicking and the eye of the machine let out a blue light.  Maria tried to pull Elle further away, but Elle fell from fright. At that moment, the mysterious whirling began again, but it was a lot closer and a blue police box began to materialize in the hallway of the room.  

When the box finished materializing, the doors swung open and an old man ran out, holding hands with….

“Y/N?!”   
\--

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry that this update took so long! College is hard! Please tell us if you want more updates. We hope you are loving this story and continue to read and enjoy your journey with The Doctor ;)
> 
> Much love, V. and SM


	3. Reunion

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey there, we're back with an update that we hope you'll enjoy!

There was a brief moment when everything in the room seemed to stop. Y/N looked from the awakened Dalek, to her frightened roommates that were clinging onto one another, and then to the Doctor whose face displayed such hatred that she froze. She hadn’t known him for long, but somehow, seeing him like that made her feel...unsettled.   
“DOCK-TOR,” came the Dalek’s surprisingly high-pitched voice, jarring Y/N from her thoughts. The Doctor dropped her hand, reaching inside of his jacket and taking out his sonic and pointing it at the Dalek.

“Why are you here? What could you possibly want with this place?” The Doctor asked, scanning the machine. When he looked down to read what the sonic found, Elle broke away from Victoria’s grip and lunged for the Dalek. Maria yelled for Elle to stop, but she didn’t. The Doctor looked up just in time to see what was happening. He reached out and grabbed the girl’s arm, pulling her safely away.

“Why would you do that, hmm?!” He shook her when she didn’t respond immediately. He could see tears welling in her eyes and knew he was probably scaring her, but he didn’t care. “Do you even know what that thing is? DO YOU?!” Tears were running down her face now, and she was shaking her head and pleading with him to stop. Maria had made her way over to the two and was pulling Elle behind her so that she was standing in between them.

“Who do you think you are?! You can’t go around screaming at people like that! You don’t even know us!” She raged at him, automatically going into her fighting stance. The Doctor scoffed, feeling angrier than he had in a long time.

“You’re abso-bloody-lutely right. I don’t know you. But you know what I do know?” Maria cocked her eyebrow in response, folding her arms across her chest. The Doctor bent down so he was looking straight into her eyes. “I know that this ‘thing’ is the most dangerous creature in the whole Universe. I know that one of you idiots touched it, which gave it all of the biological energy it needed to reboot itself after going into complete lockdown. I know that I’ve been here less than five minutes and I’ve already had to save your little friend here from a quick and very painful death. So, I’d like it if you could turn the attitude down a bit, deerie, and let me do my job.”

Victoria’s jaw dropped. All the rage she had been feeling seeped out of her, leaving her face and ears burning with the intensity of her embarrassment. The Doctor spun around, making his way back over to the Dalek. He began talking to himself again, but Maria ignored it, turning around to take the still-crying Elle into her arms.  
“It’s okay, E,” she soothed, rubbing the shorter girl’s back until she calmed down. When she finally did, Maria turned to look at Y/N, who had been standing still as a statue while all of this was going down. 

“What the hell is going on?!” Maria demanded of her roommate, letting go of Elle. Y/N looked between the two, trying to find the right words to explain everything that had happened to her today. She opened and closed her mouth several times before finally beginning her story. 

“So, you remember when I told you about the girl I met in the Quad?” The girls nodded. “Well, when she gave me her number, she apparently downloaded this weird app on my phone. I didn’t really think anything of it until this morning, when that thing appeared out of nowhere in the middle of my room.” She gestured to the Dalek.  
“Why didn’t you say anything?” Maria asked, knowing that they had all been awake at the same time. She had even spoken to Y/N that morning! 

“I don’t know, I had already told you all I was going to class and I thought it would look weird. I know, it’s dumb,” she quickly added, seeing Victoria’s expression. “But yeah. Anyway, my phone started buzzing like crazy in my pocket, so I took it out and the app was open and telling me to hold the phone up in front of the Dalek’s eyestalk. It shut down, or whatever, and I was going to run into your room and tell you all about it, but I realised I was gonna be late to Bio, so I just went to class.” The girls were quiet for a while, taking all of this in. The Doctor was still talking to the Dalek but was getting no response. Finally, Elle addressed the other elephant in the room.

“So, why were you in a phonebooth with that old guy? And how did it get here?” she asked. 

“Come on!” The Doctor called out indignantly, making Y/N giggle in response. Maria saw this and frowned. 

“Do you know him?” Y/N whipped her head around to look back at her friend. 

“Not really. I met him when I was walking to class. He was asking about the Dalek, so I came up and showed him--”

“So that’s why you came back! We heard your door open and close, but we didn’t know why you’d come back,” Elle exclaimed. Maria nodded. Then she frowned again.

“But when we came to ask about the sound, you weren’t there--”

“What sound?” Y/N interrupted. Maria and Elle looked at each other, not quite sure how to explain. Then they looked around the room, at the Dalek, the old man prancing around it, and the big blue box taking up most of the space that was left in Y/N’s room and came to the mutual agreement that nothing was weird anymore.

“After you left, we heard this loud noise. It sounded like it came from inside the building, or something. It was really weird, Y/N/N, it was like…” Elle trailed off, unsure of herself. Maria continued for her.

“It sounded like we weren’t supposed to hear it.” To the girls’ surprise, Y/N nodded as though she knew exactly what they were talking about.

“That would be the Doctor’s TARDIS. That’s the noise she makes when she starts and stops.” Her friends just stared at her.

“Who’s what?” Elle asked, completely confused. Y/N laughed, but quickly sobered up at the glares she got.

“That’s the Doctor. He owns a machine that can go anywhere in time and space. That-” she pointed at the box, “is the TARDIS. He called her ‘she’ for some reason, but who am I to judge, ya know?” The two turned to look at the TARDIS, completely transfixed.

“It’s so small!” Maria cried. The Doctor stopped waving his screwdriver around and looked over at the girls in dismay. Y/N and the Doctor shared a glance from across the room. She put her hands out two her two best friends in the world.

“I can show you around, if you like,” she offered. Elle grabbed her hand excitedly, but Maria was still skeptical.

“What do you mean, show us around?! It probably wouldn’t even fit all of us! It’s-”

“FULL REBOOT COMPLETE! ENEMY IS IDENTIFIED! DOCK-TOR IS LOCATED! EXTERMINATE!!!!!” The girls all jumped and turned around to see the Doctor dodging the Dalek’s laser blasts. It was fully awake now, moving its head and... arm-looking things around. To Y/N, it sounded a lot like it was having a temper-tantrum. A blast whistled past Y/N’s ear, close enough that she could feel the immense heat singe some of her fly-away hair. She ducked behind her dresser, pulling her friends with her. A very deadly tantrum, actually.

“Doctor, what did you do?!” She asked over the sounds of various things in her room getting blown to bits. If it hurt her stuffed Winnie the Pooh bear, she would kill it with her bare hands. The Doctor shrugged, trying to disable it with different frequencies of his sonic.

“I dunno! It just went rabid all of a sudden!” His mind was running at a million miles a second, trying to think of the best way to stop the Dalek from leaving Y/N’s room and killing every person at the college. The idea that kept coming up was dangerous - stupid even - but it was the only thing that he could think of. He got Y/N’s attention, continuing his assault on the Dalek’s electronic bits. 

“Y/N, get the app ready on your phone.” 

Y/N nodded, and without questions, took out her phone and opened the app. The same instructions came up as before: “Hold your phone up in front of the Dalek eyestalk.”

“Doctor, I have to get in front of it,” 

“What? No, that’s impossible, you’d get killed immediately.” He redoubled his efforts, getting increasingly frustrated with each second passing. 

“You know this is the only way. You said yourself that you don’t even have the right codes. I do. It has to be me.” The Doctor stared at her, then at the Dalek, and then at her roommates. He sighed. He ducked under the Dalek’s line of fire and ran over to where the three girls were crouched. 

“On the count of three, we’re all going to run into the TARDIS.” He snapped his fingers and the doors flew open, shedding a blue-white light over the room. “The Dalek is going to follow us, and then Y/N is going to disable it.” He turned to Y/N, studying her features. 

“Are you gonna be okay?” Y/N didn’t hesitate to nod, but he could see the fear in her eyes. He reached out and covered her hand with his, giving it a quick squeeze before pulling away and turning to face the TARDIS. Y/N stared down at her hand, unwilling to look up and see how Maria and Elle were undoubtedly staring at her. The Doctor waved his hand at them. 

“Okay. One...two...three...Go!” They all ran, weaving and ducking to avoid the Dalek’s lasers. When they were all inside the TARDIS, the Dalek slowly turned itself around to face them. 

“EXTERMINATE!!!!!!!!!” It advanced, but Y/N was ready for it. She thrust her phone in front of her, aiming at the eyestalk. She walked backwards, leading the Dalek into the TARDIS. Once it was inside, the Doctor snapped and the doors slammed shut, making the Dalek stop its approach. Everything was still. Y/N pushed a button on her phone, and an ear shattering sound filled the room. The Dalek started to make a noise which made Y/N’s skin crawl. Then, she realised that it was screaming. She had no time to move before a single, perfectly aimed blast shot out of the Dalek’s gun and hit her straight in her chest. 

Everything happened in slow-motion. Y/N fell to the ground, her phone slipping out of her hand and falling off the side of the TARDIS platform. The Dalek’s head exploded, sending chunks of metal and something strangely gooey everywhere. No one in the room cared about the Dalek, though. They all rushed to Y/N’s side, none of them fast enough to catch her. The two girls dropped to their knees on her left side, and the Doctor knelt, much more carefully, on her right. Maria bent down over her friend’s mouth to listen for breath while Elle tried to wake her up. The Doctor got out his sonic screwdriver and began to scan her body for signs of life. 

“Y/N? Y/N, please wake up!” Elle pleaded. “Don’t be my Mufasa. You have to wake up!” She shook Y/N, feeling tears running down her cheeks. Maria straightened up, feeling hopeless. She hadn’t felt any pulse or heard Y/N breathing at all. She examined her friend, seeing the hole in her shirt from the laser. Her hand went to inspect it, but she saw the blood seeping into the fabric around the hole and felt sick to her stomach. She looked up at the man - the “Doctor” - who was still waving his stupid toy above Y/N’s abdomen. She felt all the rage she had from earlier return in kind. 

“Aren’t you going to do something, Doctor? She’s dead because of you!” He looked up at her, and she suddenly had never been more afraid for her life than she was in the face of that deadly expression. If looks could kill, she would be dead ten times over. 

“She isn’t dead, you stupid girl. She’s in shock. If she were dead, she would be nothing but ash on my floor. And I am doing something, for your information. I’m using my sonic screwdriver to start the healing process of her burn. If you would’ve just asked before getting your knickers in a twist, you would’ve known that. Now move aside. I have to take her to medbay.” He stood, effortlessly lifting Y/N’s body into his arms as he went. Maria was not about to let him talk down to her like that, however, and she grabbed his arm as he turned to leave.

“You can stand here and talk down to me and show off all you want; I quite honestly could care less. But, that girl in your arms is our sister. We would do anything to keep her safe. You walk around like you’re the savior of the world and you say that you can help her. My gut tells me to trust you but that doesn’t mean I like you. So, you better check yourself before I smack your arrogance out of existence. Now, get to it stat, Doctor.” 

The Doctor stared at Victoria. He was not used to being talked to like that by anyone, especially not strangers who were fetuses compared to him. He did not get dressed-down by people. That was not a thing. As a result, the few times it had happened to him had forced him to slow down and assess the situation around him. 

He looked down at the disturbingly pale face of a girl he had just met a few hours ago, and marveled at the fervor that crept up on him. He shouldn’t care about losing her. He shouldn’t even be thinking about it like that. Somehow, this annoyingly ordinary human girl had wriggled her way into his heart within such a short amount of time that alarm bells should’ve been going off in his mind. As it was, he just shook his head and looked back up at the girls. 

“I...sorry.” he managed, feeling far too many emotions at once. He and Maria shared a look, and instantly he could tell that they were on the same side, and that he could trust her. There was something deep in her dark eyes that told him that she was destined to do great things one day. Their moment was interrupted by Y/N making a noise filled with such pain that it stopped his hearts, and made both Maria and Elle rush forward. Thankfully, she hadn’t woken up, or else she would’ve been in an unbearable amount of pain, but he knew he was running out of time. The sonic had only made temporary progress, so the TARDIS would have to finish the healing process, and fast. 

“We have to get her to medbay now.” The girls both nodded, and followed him through the winding halls of the TARDIS.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> What's next for the girls and The Doctor? Who was the lady you met in the Quad that gave you the app? Let us know if you want an update!


End file.
